Eleventh Dream Day paired well with The Dream Syndicate (they’ve recorded with Steve Wynn in the past) though they have a harder rocking vibe: raw, fuzzed-out guitar jams, noise rock with melody. Original members Rick Rizzo (guitar, vocals), Doug McCombs (bass) and Janet Beveridge Bean (drums and vocals) are still playing strong – especially Bean who is a power player and wailer and I’m just a little obsessed.

We were able to get Bean’s setlist (on a styrofoam plate – not earth-friendly but able to withstand the monstrous beats) and a few of the songs from Works for Tomorrow were my favorite of the night.

Those songs included “Vanishing Point” on which Bean has lead vocals – it’s hard-driving and punked-up; “Cheap Gasoline” and “Go Tell It” are punk-blues at their finest where Rizzo and Bean share vocals. Also great is “Requiem for 4 Chambers” which sounds like it should be an orchestral string ensemble piece but is more like a country-twinged (punk) rocker with slide guitar and pounding organ (though towards the end there is some borderline choral chanting courtesy of Bean).

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Emerge is a mix of psychedelia and hard-rocking proto-punk garage rock. The opening track, “Journeys,” reminds me a lot of fellow Midwesterners (from Detroit) The Amboy Dukes’ 1968 one-hit wonder “Journey to the Center of the Mind” (I will add this is the only Ted Nugent anything I will willingly listen to). “Feeling” has another Detroit flavor, this time reminiscent of the MC5 sound. “Blue Ice” is a little bit of both sounds (psych and hard rock) and “For What It’s Worth” is a cover of Buffalo Springfield’s 1967 Top 10 hit that goes psych and slow on the verses and punkishly hard rocking on the chorus. They also cover the Burt Bacharach-composed “My Little Red Book” (they drop the “My” for the title) which became a hit for Love in 1966, keeping Love’s garage rock style. “Breakfast at Gardenson’s” is not my favorite, it’s a bit sappy and formulaic in its psychedelia and the closing track, “Future of the Past,” mashes up all the trends in 60′s harder rock into one epic 12+ minute musical trip. (It’s too long for my tastes but I’m listening to this at midday on a Monday and its better suited to a very late Saturday night.)

This album was in the “should it stay or should it go” pile and from what I’ve heard on this first ever listen, I think it should stay: I like psych and garage rock and it’s got a solid Midwestern pedigree.

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